The sport of kings has been around for centuries in the United Kingdom, but the official “Champion Trainer” title wasn’t concocted until 1896.
The Champion Trainer of Flat racing in the UK is the trainer whose horses have won the most prize money during that season.
Most British Flat Champion Trainer Titles:
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Alec Taylor Jr - 12 titles
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Sir Henry Cecil - 10 titles
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Sir Michael Stoute - 10 titles
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Noel Murless - 9 titles
The Trainers Championship was originally run from November until the end of the following October but since 2016 the period covered is from January until December.
Let’s take a look through the winning-most UK Champion Flat Trainers of all time:
Alec Taylor Jr
- Years won: 1907, 1909, 1910, 1914, 1917, 1918, 1919, 1920, 1921, 1922, 1923, 1925.
Popularly known as ‘The Wizard of Manton’, Alec Taylor was champion trainer 12 times and saddled over 1,000 winners.
He achieved his first Classic success with the 40-1 outsider in the horse racing betting, Challacombe in the 1905 St Leger.
Taylor was crowned champion trainer for the first time in 1907 and he took the title a further 11 times up until 1925.
The last of Taylor’s total of 21 Classic winners was Book Law in the 1927 St Leger. He retired at the end of that season and handed over the Manton stables to his former assistant Joe Lawson.
Sir Henry Cecil
- Years won: 1976, 1978, 1979, 1982, 1984, 1985, 1987, 1988, 1990, 1993.
Responsible for 25 British Classic winners and crowned champion trainer 10 times, Henry Cecil was also one of the leading handlers at Royal Ascot for many a year.
Knighted by the late Queen in 2011, his later years saw him battle cancer but his darker days were illuminated by the great Frankel, unbeaten in 14 starts before retirement.
Four Derby winners - Slip Anchor, Reference Point, Commander In Chief and Oath adorned his wonderful C.V.
Sir Michael Stoute
- Years won: 1981, 1986, 1989, 1994, 1997, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2009.
The ten-time Champion Trainer has accumulated over 4,000 winners in Britain since enjoying his first success at Newmarket in 1972.
Only Mark Johnston and Richard Hannon have had more winners on these shores, but neither of them are still training horses unlike Stoute who is still hard at it.
Stoute became the oldest trainer to win the Derby, aged 76, when his horse Desert Crown took the Epsom Classic. It was the sixth time he had won the race.
Stoute’s other horse racing claims to fame are 80+ Royal Ascot winners and 16 British Classic winners.
Noel Murless
- Years won: 1948, 1957, 1959, 1960, 1961, 1967, 1968, 1970, 1973.
After Sir Charles Francis Noel Murless (1910-1987) retired as a professional jump jockey he became a trainer, working successfully from Hambleton, near Thirsk, with a limited number of horses.
However, on the retirement of Fred Darling at the end of the 1947 Flat season, Murless took over Beckhampton and retained top jockey Gordon Richards.
The following year he was Champion Trainer for the first time and topped the lists a further eight times in his career.
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*Credit for all of the photos in this article belongs to Alamy*
